Why is it that a disproportionate amount of physicists are Jewish?

From what I, and many others have observed, an extremely disproportionate amount of physicists are Jewish (comparing it to how many Jews there actually are). Does anyone have any explanations for this?

And I don't really know. What I -do- know is that I read somewhere that Jewish people have on average the highest IQ of the population. Perhaps this leads more Jewish people to go into the sciences.

Ooooh, racism! No, people, this is SCIENCE! *kicks people with methodology*

But the truth is, a.) I'm not even sure whether there actually ARE relatively more Jewish people in physics, and b.) I'm too lazy to start looking for that IQ-related study, so you might as well ignore that remark.

Well, we've only really -had- science the way it is now since approximately the 19th century, so that might not be all that weird. Seriously though, OP, sources, sources, sources! How am I even supposed to know whether there are relatively more Jews in physics than there are in other fields? Since I'm not into the field of research myself (yet), I can't say I have observed this yet.

Staff: Mentor

From what I, and many others have observed, an extremely disproportionate amount of physicists are Jewish (comparing it to how many Jews there actually are). Does anyone have any explanations for this?

Please don't rspond with "I'm a physicist and I'm not Jewish."

Please post the statistics that show this.

There was a similar thread posted not too long ago and that person was wrong about the numbers.

I'm asking the question simply because I'm curious as to why! There could be some fascinating explanation that I would like to know. Or there could be no explanation. In no way am I dividing people up based off of beliefs.

Jewish people have a long history of pushing their children to excel, we are now seeing more Indian and Asian scientists, but it's irrelvant how many are Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, etc...

Why is it "irrelevant", Evo?
The most repressive culture on Earth has just about zero achievers; Abdus Salam belonged to the "heretical" and heavily persecuted sect of Ahmadiiyah.
Ambient culture DO have a lot to say about how their children excel.

Staff: Mentor

Why is it "irrelevant", Evo?
The most repressive culture on Earth has just about zero achievers; Abdus Salam belonged to the "heretical" and heavily persecuted sect of Ahmadiiyah.
Ambient culture DO have a lot to say about how their children excel.

I don't like separating people this way. I don't want this to get into a "this group is smarter than that group" discussion.

I'm asking the question simply because I'm curious as to why! There could be some fascinating explanation that I would like to know. Or there could be no explanation. In no way am I dividing people up based off of beliefs.

I believe it's because of their tradition of scholarship that goes back, not just centuries, but millenia. For thousands of years Jews have maintained a tradition of intense daily study of their religious texts, and also of discussion and debate about them. This leads to them cultivating sharp, inquisitive, logical minds. The most religious of them respectfully debate fine points of religion daily with each other and are constantly examining the centuries-old commentary on the Torah by generations of great Rabbis, called the Talmud.

When Jews leave their faith and become secular they tend to plug all this scholarly intensity and facility for logic of any kind into equally demanding fields and that traditional discipline can last in families for a few generations, even removed from the initial religious demand for it. Jews are said to be disproportionately represented in many fields: medicine, law, music, commerce, film, to name some.

As far as science and medecine we see the Asians in the US becoming the new Jews. Same reason: they have a longstanding tradition of respect for math and medicine that is imparted and maintained by the family, not just in schools.

That's not what we're doing, Evo. We're talking about cultures, and how they encourage education compared to other cultures.

I think I have an explanation for my question after thinking for a little bit. Having grown up in a jewish family, (I am completely non-religious and atheist by the way), I have noticed that in Hebrew school/ temple, they encourage questioning the torah, and thinking about these very deep questions, which I believe sparks off an interest in finding the answer to these questions.

From what I, and many others have observed, an extremely disproportionate amount of physicists are Jewish (comparing it to how many Jews there actually are). Does anyone have any explanations for this?